


A Different Outcome

by TSylvestris



Series: Nitroglycerine [2]
Category: BBC Sherlock, Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Anal Sex, Blowjobs, Fingering, Fucking up and trying to set things to rights again, Hungers and desires and self-denial, M/M, Nitroglycerine as a remedy for a damaged heart, Oral Sex, Slash, handjobs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-20
Updated: 2017-06-18
Packaged: 2017-12-30 00:20:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1011788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TSylvestris/pseuds/TSylvestris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What do you do when the pieces of your old life don't fit together anymore, and the strategies you used to get by no longer work?  </p><p>Sequel to “The Thing Is.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I hadn't originally planned for there to be a sequel to "The Thing Is," but as usual in my life this story walked all over me and so here we all are again.
> 
> Also as usual, I owe huge debts of gratitude to **Pat_is_fannish** and **Strangegibbon** , betas extraordinares. Really, they deserve sainthood for putting up with me. Bless them both. 
> 
> All blunders and errors are solely mine.

“ _Isn’t it time we try a different approach if we are to hope for a different outcome?”_ —Mycroft Holmes (The Thing Is)

* * *

 

The leather jacket still fit, though not as snugly through the shoulders anymore and a little tight over the belly if Greg zipped it up. It was 22 degrees out and zipping would have been ridiculous anyway. _Wearing_ it was ridiculous, but Greg couldn't do this in his own skin.

He knew what his younger self would have made of a man like him: middle-aged, wedding ring recently removed, too carefully shaven, clothes too carefully chosen, too nervous. He'd never gone home with that sort of man, never wanted to be somebody's bit on the side. He'd had the luxury of choice, back then.

He lingered across the street from the club and wished he remembered how to do this. Ah, fuck it, he was sure all the things he'd used to be good at weren't what was done anymore, but he wanted this badly enough to risk looking like the damned fool he undoubtedly was, so he put a bit of his old swagger into his stride and let the flow of human traffic carry him to the door.

Three drinks later, he'd had a flattering amount of attention paid to him and was beginning to realise he could afford to be choosier than he'd thought. He was still reeling in a very pleasant way from turning down an offer of a threesome (and wondering what the hell was wrong with him, _turning down a threesome)_ when the scent of expensive cologne wafted lightly over him and hit his dick like a goddamned freight train.

“Good evening.” The voice matched the cologne, and when Greg turned around, the clothes matched everything. Wet-fox hair, sharp features, high hairline that would be receding in a few years, lovely soft hands.

When he'd been sixteen, the first public-school boy Greg had ever pulled—the first _boy_ he'd ever pulled, not yet understanding about himself, not yet knowing he could like both tits and cock, but knowing he wanted _something more_ and wanted it from this boy _—_ that boy had tugged Greg into the dark, empty place under a pier and sucked him until Greg had been sobbing, shaking, coming with a fist shoved into his mouth, wiping tears from his eyes afterwards, and that posh voice had whispered filthy, filthy directions as Greg clumsily returned the favour. That memory had fueled many of Greg's favourite wanks for years afterwards. 

“Evening,” Greg said, and wished like hell he could think of something else to say. “Uh, buy you a drink?” Damn it, wrong way 'round, and he inwardly winced and kicked himself.

The man tilted his head as if Greg had just done something interesting, and after a slow, lazy moment, he challenged lightly, “What would you suggest?”

The laughter bubbled out of Greg before he knew it was coming. “From this place? Good God, this swill is for kids who wouldn't know Laphroaig from Loch Dhu. Anything you've got back at yours would be miles better.” He hadn't meant to say that last bit. It'd just spilled out, like the laughter. “Greg,” he said to cover the awkwardness, and offered his hand. 

“Believe me when I say names are hardly necessary.” The hand in his clasped firmly, warm and dry, and all right, an anonymous shag wasn't what Greg had been hoping for, but it would do. He let his fingertips brush the inside of the wrist just below the cuffs and didn't imagine the quick indrawn breath from the other man. “Would a thirty-year Talisker suit your refined palate?”

Greg was a police officer. He knew damned well why a body did not go off to a stranger's house on the promise of drink and sex. But Greg had decided that afternoon to finally put an end to the marriage that hadn't been going right for years, if it ever really had done, and this posh bloke was hitting all his buttons, reminding him of another time when his world had suddenly opened to unimagined possibilities, and Greg thought, _Fuck it, I want this._

“Is that the best you can offer?” he asked cheekily, and was delighted to see a small, surprised, pleased smile in return.

# # #

The address they ended up at—well, “posh” didn't come close. There had been bleeding suits of armour in the room with the whisky and the fireplace, where they'd had the promised drinks. The bedroom had a fireplace too, come to that, and Greg was nearly dizzy with hope and anticipation and the erotic associations of so much luxury.

The man turned from hanging up his suit jacket and came to the bedside, where Greg had been invited to sit but was standing instead. “There are condoms and lubricant in the nightstand,” he said, not touching yet. “I must insist—”

“Yes,” Greg said immediately. “Yes, me too. I have some as well.”

“Use whichever you prefer, then.” Finally he stepped in close enough for Greg to breathe in that scent that had been curling its way down his spine, and Greg cupped the back of his head and met his lips.

The kissing was lovely and hungry and started a burn low in Greg's belly. He took his time, sliding hands up and down the wiry back for a long, long while before undoing buttons and pushing fine cotton halfway off. There was more chest hair than Greg had expected, and freckles peppering pale shoulders. And oh, _yes,_ although the fabric of that shirt was still crisp, Greg tasted salt on skin when he tongued a nipple, and it was wonderful.

The man started to go to his knees, but Greg wanted male musk and body hair and a fat prick on his tongue, wanted to remember exactly who he was with. He drew him up and pressed him towards the bed. “Let me.” His voice was much rougher than when they'd started, and he liked the way the man's eyes went wide and dark.

The taste of latex was nowhere in his fantasies, but without it he wouldn't get any of this at all. He made up for it by licking the salty crease of a thigh, the nicely heavy bollocks, the trail of hair from navel to flushed cock. When he closed his mouth around the cockhead, the belly under his forehead quivered and a soft hand touched his hair lightly; still polite, still careful, and Greg didn't want that. He wanted him shattered, broken to pieces, shaking and swearing and shoving himself down Greg's throat. 

The toff made a perfectly lovely noise when Greg told him that. 

It'd been years and he choked at first until his body remembered and he got the knack of it again. Then he was able to lose himself in the scents, the painfully tight grip in his hair, the hips moving under his fingers, the drool on his chin. The quiet, shuddering sighs above turned sharp when, after what seemed like hours of sucking and licking, he brusquely slid his forefinger straight into the nob's spit-wet arse and the man gasped, thrust hard for a few throat-bruising moments, and came. 

Greg stripped off the condom and flipped him onto his belly, smearing the fine sheets. “Let me fuck you,” he said, and it came out less commanding and more pleading than he'd intended. “You can manage twice tonight, yeah? You can have me after,” he promised, and shuddered because oh, God, yes, _please._

He made a long, slow time of it. So many things he'd missed, so many things he'd regretted never doing with a man. A one-night stand, an anonymous fuck, no-one he'd ever have to face again. Bollocks-deep, he leaned forward, snugged his arms around the lean, sweat-slick shoulders, pressed kisses to hot skin. He poured lube over the head of the man’s cock, held it in a slick fist and fucked his foreskin with an index finger; when the man cried out, utterly shocked, Greg managed only seconds more before he groaned and pulled out and barely got the condom off in time to come over the sleek back beneath him, rub it all over smooth skin.  

Afterwards he offered himself shamelessly, begging loudly, silently damning the layer of rubber between them. The pillow smelt of cologne. The hands on his prick and in his mouth and deep up his arse were soft and fine and none too polite after all, and the man fucked the breath out of him with a thoroughness bordering on greed.

Greg indulged in something dangerously, embarrassingly close to cuddling as their sweat dried. His arse burned and tickled with lube. He stretched and sighed, debauched and contented, drunk on touch, and ruffled dark, damp hair affectionately before the man rolled off. “Thanks for that,” he said. He could feel himself smiling, feel peace and optimism settle over him like golden light. “For all of this. Thank you.”

When he finally got back to his empty home at an ungodly hour, he hung up the leather jacket with no small amount of satisfaction and went to bed without showering, rubbing the faint scent of expensive cologne into his own sheets.

He spent Sunday thinking about possibilities.

He'd see a solicitor on Monday, get the divorce started. He supposed it should have been harder, sadder, to put an end to things, but really, Holmes (twat though he was) had been right. She was cheating, had been for a long time, and the marriage never had been what it should have been. No, it wasn't hard.

And things were different now, not like back when he'd joined the Met. Non-discrimination policies and the like, even if the Chief did have a stick up his arse. No, a lot of things were different now. A lot of things could be different for Greg, if he was brave enough. 

He figured he was just about ready to be brave enough. 

On Monday morning he walked around the hall corner to his office, already thinking about the good coffee and the breakfast sandwich he'd splurged on at the shop to make the morning paperwork a bit less miserable, noting absently that the hallway was unusually quiet, when over the aroma of sausage he smelt a familiar cologne.

The fox-haired man was sitting beside his desk. Greg's stomach abruptly dropped through the floor.

“Detective Sergeant Gregory Lestrade.” The man rose and offered his hand. Sharks had warmer smiles. “How delightful to see you again.”

Greg set the bag and coffee firmly on his desk. “Let me save us some time. You don't need money and I haven't got any anyway. I won't compromise an investigation and I won't lose evidence for you. Whatever you think you can blackmail me for—” 

“Do sit down, Sergeant. You have it all wrong. I'm only here to ask for a small favour, and I'm prepared to be quite generously grateful if you co-operate.”

“A favour, but it's got nothing to do with my job even though you're in my office. Right, sure.”

“Of course there's a connection with your work. I have a younger brother about whom I am greatly concerned. I wonder if you might agree to check in on him from time to time and let me know how he's doing.”

“There's a different department for that.” _I've had my hand up your arse,_ he thought. _I rubbed my come over your face. You shouldn't be this damned intimidating._

“I'm not asking you to do it in an _official_ capacity. It's not just for my benefit, but yours as well. Despite his hopelessly obnoxious manner, I believe you've found him quite useful at times. In fact, as you are aware, his unacknowledged assistance with several difficult cases may have been instrumental in your possible promotion, Detective Sergeant. You're up for review shortly, are you not?”

“Bloody hell,” Greg whispered, because the penny had finally dropped. “You mean Holmes. The junkie.” He tightened his fingers on the edge of the desk so as not to grab the smug git by the lapels.

After a few moments of silence, the bastard mused absently, “Your new Chief Superintendent is known for such...rigid habits of mind. Little tolerance for unconventionality, particularly for...proclivities that could be said to be the cause of marital dissolution. So difficult to prove discrimination when one's superiors simply argue that one's current rank is the one beyond which one has not the talent to advance. However should such a thing be refuted?”

Greg cursed, low and vicious. “Did you know who I was before you pulled me?”

“Of course, Sergeant.”

 _I won't do it,_ Greg told himself. _Never, never co-operate with a blackmailer. You're fucked either way._

There was a bottle of thirty-year Talisker on his kitchen table when he got home that evening. He sat with his head in his hands for a long time.

Three and a half weeks later his wife said she'd like to try again, and he discovered just how big a coward he really was.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My thanks, as always, to **Pat_is_fannish** and **strangegibbon** , who made this better than it was and who deserve medals for the feat. All errors, blunders, lapses in sanity, and spells of contrariness are my own.
> 
> To every single person who commented, subscribed, left kudos, and lurked: Thank you for taking the time out of your day to engage with this story. I truly appreciate that.

He'd very nearly died thrice in the span of four hours, they told him. He'd been shot, suffered a myocardial infarction, and then been poisoned.

His civilian doctors had recommended lifestyle changes for the betterment of his health. _I shall earnestly endeavour to avoid being shot by my brother-in-law or poisoned by my enemies in future,_ he whimsically imagined assuring them. _I have learned from past mistakes._  

His personal physician was a woman of resounding good sense and practicality, thank God.

“—depression and anxiety. Do not give me that look, Mycroft Holmes. They are serious and well documented sequelae of a heart attack and they increase your risk of sudden death. Do you understand me?”

“Eliza—” he said, and couldn't keep the betrayal from his tone. 

“I realise this is anathema to an upper-class, repressed British male of your age, but as your consultant I need this information. How many episodes in the past week?”

“Four,” he admitted.

“At least eight, then. Severity?”

“Moderate.”

She made sure he saw her tick “severe” on the tablet. Eliza had an eidetic memory and Mycroft's record would be wiped before she left the building, so the gesture was especially pointed.

The garden view outside his window was grim this time of year.

“I understand,” she said quietly, “that antidepressants are not an option for a man in your position. In many cases an exercise programme can provide the same benefits. No-one would question your new dedication to cardiovascular health.” No stigma and no reason for anyone to look further into his motives, she meant.

The _Fritillaria_ would not be in bloom for months. The _Lonicera_ on the far side of the pond would likely be spent by the time he was able to walk that far, given that merely pulling on his trousers that morning had left him breathless and trembling for fifteen minutes.

“In addition to the physical symptoms, a degree of cognitive impairment is expected and likely temporary. Expect some emotional lability as well.” Avoid public interaction, in other words. “Mycroft.” He turned his attention back from the garden. “These after-effects are not failings of your body or mind. Please do not attempt to reassert control in ways that could be deemed foolish.”

If he sighed, closed his eyes, tapped his fingers on the arm of his chair, could he disguise fatigue as exasperation? “Should I retire to the country for the holidays, do you think?”

“I would prefer you stayed closer to the Heart Centre.”

“As bad as that.”

“Yes.”

# # #

He had the Dower House closed up again once it seemed John Watson would not be moving from 221B after all. He could only hope John was attempting a reconciliation rather than just waiting to leave until Mycroft was recovered enough to deal with his brilliant, self-destructive little brother in the throes of heartbreak and despair.

 _And what exactly could I do then?_ he wondered. _I haven't been able to comfort him for a very long time._

He slept even less than before, worrying about Sherlock. His newly poor stamina made his daytime fatigue insurmountable, and often he would jerk into awareness, disoriented, having fallen asleep in his chair like a doddering pensioner.

Sherlock came from time to time on the pretext of updating him regarding Fitzhugh's clandestine trial. John came to visit out of a sense of guilt and obligation. Sherlock held himself stiffly, anxious eyes tracking John when he thought no-one could see, and John tried so hard to forgive that it left Mycroft frightened at his inability to do so.

There was something lost there, he thought, lost forever, and Sherlock understood that only too well even if he still didn't understand why.

At night, when he couldn't sleep, couldn't focus enough to read, couldn't get up to pace around the empty house, he found himself twisting pinches of the sheets between his fingers and silently begging John: _Please. It isn't fair of me to ask it of you, but he is my brother. Please._  

# # # 

Mrs Hudson sent fairy cakes. 

Sherlock made predictably snide comments about his weight until John said, _“Sherlock._ A word, if you please,” and jerked his head towards the doorway.

When Sherlock returned, he looked very closely at Mycroft in a way he had not done for years, observing, cataloguing, processing new data, sifting through Mycroft's mind in a distinctly unpleasant and exposing manner.

The fat jokes stopped.

Mycroft shattered a brandy snifter in the fireplace and shook with ridiculous, irrational, impotent rage. _Even that. You poison even that. I finally get that from you and it's out of_ _pity_ _._

_How can John bear you?_

# # # 

“I set Lestrade's flat on fire, so he'll need to stay here until he finds a new one,” Sherlock informed him. Mycroft noted the absence of the word “accidentally.”

Frequently, Mycroft despaired of the human race. Was it really not _too_ suggestive that a flat in a prime area of central London—specifically, 221C, a terrible security risk if occupied—remained unlet and empty, damp notwithstanding? Or that Mrs Hudson had ceased to receive bills for any utility at Baker Street since Mycroft's brother had moved into her building?

The good Detective Inspector was informed of his new Craven Hill flat, an easy Tube ride from New Scotland Yard yet miraculously affordable on a policeman's salary, before he left his office that same day. Mycroft retained a very, very good barrister for the arson charge that never went to court, and Inland Revenue unexpectedly discovered they had a few matters to discuss with the landlord.

_I am not helpless, I am not without resources, and I do not want your sympathy. Fix your own life, Brother._

# # # 

On his slow perambulations along the bleak garden paths—exercise had not grown any less hateful since he had last resorted to it—he often wondered what might have been.

He had many regrets, but few things he could have done differently. He'd had fewer options in the past, less experience, less influence, a shorter perspective.

 _I am sorry_ , he told so many people. _I did what I had to do. I did what I was capable of at the time._

When he sat on the bench by the winter pond and tossed maize to the ducks, he wondered if that was really the best legacy he could leave behind.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My thanks once again to **Pat_is_fannish** and **strangegibbon** , who made this better than it was. Without their help, you would cry when you read this and not in the good way. As always, all errors, blunders, vocabulary choices, lapses in sanity, and spells of contrariness are my own.
> 
> To every single person who commented, subscribed, left kudos, and lurked: Thank you for taking the time out of your day to engage with this story. I'm deeply grateful that you chose to do so.

He had never known the Baker Street flat to be so quiet. If not for the faint scrapes and shuffles from the upstairs bedroom, it might have been his own sitting room.

His second cup of what he would generously call tea was tepid when the street door slammed and Sherlock thumped up the stairs two at a time to sweep into the room with barely concealed alarm, eyes flicking from Mycroft to the patient file on the table and then to the ceiling, whence came the sounds of John's packing.

“Only two days,” Mycroft said quietly. “Three at most.”

Sherlock threw his dripping coat at its hook and flung himself into his chair, where he sprawled resentfully in his brother's direction. Mycroft's eye was caught by the belt at his waist.

“Sherlock?” John stood awkwardly at the threshold, holding a half-folded jumper. “Did Dimmock find—oh.” He blinked at Mycroft. “You're still here.”

“It was the neighbour,” Sherlock said, clipped short.

“Oh.” He shifted the jumper from hand to hand. “Mycroft brought—I have a case. A patient. In Bruges. I'll fly out in the morning, be back by Thursday.”

“Yes, fine.” Sherlock waved irritably. “As you wish.” Before Mycroft could wince, Sherlock bounded to his feet, snatched a biscuit from the tea tray, stuffed it in his mouth on his way to the bathroom, and growled to Mycroft through the crumbs, “This had better be something worth his time.” The door banged shut behind him.

When Mycroft rose to leave, much of the earlier tension had ebbed from John's shoulders.

Tyres hissed wetly on the drive home, a constant white noise. The belt, he reflected, was not an encouraging development, given how easily Sherlock went from slender to gaunt under stress, but other than the addition of easily removed belt loops, he hadn't had his trousers altered and therefore must still hope for an improvement in his relationship with John. There was that much, at least.

His house was dark. There would be no messages waiting. Philip had made that clear: “You know how it is, Mycroft, your brother being the one to bring evidence against Fitz. Can't have it looking  _ political.  _ So her orders to you—”

Nadira Saini was on a ventilator in Bruges because Mycroft was required to sit in his garden and feed ducks whilst his work was left in the hands of idiots. Intolerable.

That night he lay in a cold bed, in a house so still that the only sign of life was his undependable heartbeat, and sleep did not come, did not come, did not come.

# # #

Greg sucked cautiously at his over-full cup and tried to hobble a bit faster so he could set the thing down before his fingers got burnt. The corridors were still mostly dark. If he timed it just right, he could be sat in his office with the shades drawn by the time anyone else was in and they'd all just assume he was on desk duty.

Almost there now, he really was going to pull this off, just round the corner and—

His office blazed like the fucking O2, and in Greg's own chair behind Greg's own desk was Mycroft Holmes, flipping through Greg's own case files. For one perfectly insane moment, he thought the Chief had made good on his threat to call down the wrath of God on his head should he show his face at NSY before the stitches were out, but that was ridiculous. God might wash away half of London in the bloody floods but he'd never shift Mycroft Holmes.

“Ah, Detect—” Mycroft glanced up from the file and paused, eyes widening.

The difference between the Holmeses and other people, he thought gratefully, was that Holmeses didn't waste time saying things like “You were stabbed!” instead of just standing up and shoving a chair in your direction, and thank God for that because his ribs throbbed like bastards. The corridor between the lift and his office may as well have been a sodding parkour run.

The chair— _ his  _ chair, still warm from Mycroft Holmes' intrusive arse—smelt of cologne. Mycroft leaned that arse on the fore-edge of Greg's desk and crossed his ankles. Greg popped the lid off his cup and bent his head over it, inhaling a concentrated blast of coffee. That cologne always made his dick think it should be making the decisions, which was never a good idea but worse than usual when Mycroft was involved.

“You are officially on leave?” Mycroft asked quietly, once Greg had burnt his tongue on several swallows of too-hot dark roast.

“Mmmh.”

“That was eloquent, Detective Inspector, managing to be either 'yes' or 'no' and thereby committing yourself to neither an admission nor a lie. I must commend you.”

“Why don't you tell me what Sherlock's gone and done now, so I know just how bad my day is going to be whilst I still have decent coffee to take the edge off?”

Mycroft sighed. “He's done nothing yet. This is in the nature of a pre-emptive strike. John will be away at a medical conference for the next few days.”

“ Oh.” Bloody buggering  _ shit. _

“Indeed.”

They were both silent for long moments. Greg wondered again why in the hell he didn't just take medical retirement. No more dealing with stroppy geniuses and their terrifyingly connected relatives; no more gritting his teeth, pretending he didn't know about John's unregistered gun and the fucking vigilantism, the immunity that influence bought that made the rule of law a goddamned joke. No more being used as a child-minder when some clever toff on the outs with his boyfriend couldn't figure out how to amuse himself like everyone else had to do.

Nope. None of that anymore. Just long, long days all alone in his flat, with nothing to fill the hours.

He sighed and waved his hands at the files. “I've got nothing he'll take.”

“Yes, so I see. But someone must have.” Mycroft leaned forward. “I've a proposition for you. How would you like to sort through the Yard's active cases and claim any you want?”

Greg stared. “Steal cases from other detectives? Steal their  _ best  _ cases? Christ, that'd be a diplomacy nightmare, all right.”

“No, Inspector, global thermonuclear war is a diplomatic nightmare. Stepping on a few toes at the Metropolitan Police is a teething exercise.”

He tensed and sucked a breath at the pull across his ribs; unclenched his fingers from around the cup before he squeezed scalding coffee over his hand. “You know, I do have better things to do with my time than—”

“No, you haven't,” Mycroft said, brutally matter-of-fact. His mouth twisted bitterly. “And neither have I, at the moment. So why don't we find something nominally productive to do as we wait out the duration of these infernally tedious leaves?”

Greg told himself it was the prospect of snitching a plum case right out from under that dick Abernathy Jones that made him finally say, “Yeah, all right, what the hell,” but he suspected the cologne had more to do with it, really.

# # #

Mycroft had made it sound perfectly reasonable, of course: “Your flat is hardly the appropriate location from which to conduct confidential inquiries within secure and classified systems, is it?” And Mycroft's house  _ was,  _ because that's what privilege was: a different set of laws.

Greg didn't begrudge the rich their houses, their cars, their bespoke suits and private jets and much, much better coffee. He truly didn't. But by God, he did resent the fuck out of their private laws, and he hated himself a little for co-operating, except that Sherlock Holmes was far more likely to stop the Alphabet Cleaver than DI Jones was and the people living in Brixton cared a lot more about that than about DI Lestrade's principled stand, he was sure.

He set down the phone, leaned back in the comfy office chair, and stretched carefully, hissing at the tug of his stitches.

“Please allow me to apologise for my wretched and ungrateful brother.”

“He's taking the cases. That's all I care about.” Regretfully, Greg swallowed the last of his coffee from the china cup and wondered if the silvery tat on the rim helped the coffee taste less like the rat piss at the station, or if that was that all down to the beans.

It was coming on dusk. He should be getting back to his flat. He had things to do, like cracking open a tin and making toast and washing up the one dish and one knife from making beans on toast.

“Might I offer you supper as recompense? Not my own cooking, I assure you.” Visions of very posh takeaway delivered in shiny black cars had just begun to dance in his head when Mycroft added, “It's warming in the oven.”

“You have a cook?”

“ Ah. No. It would be in no way correct to say that I have a cook. Rather, my physician and a cook appeared on my doorstep and my physician explained that I will be paying the cook an exorbitant amount of money to do as she pleases in my kitchen. The cook informed me that she does not work evenings, weekends, or bank holidays, and that if I ever disregard her reheating instructions she will fry onions and hot dogs until my furniture reeks of them. Under the circumstances, I do not think she can be called  _ my  _ cook.”

His side hurt. He wanted to be in his own flat with his old, soft pyjama bottoms on, with beans and toast and a bed waiting when he was done washing up. But cologne coiled lazily in the pit of his stomach, and he couldn't help remembering how, in the days right after he'd filed for divorce and moved out of the house, he'd pulled every trick he knew to get visitors to come to the flat, to watch a game, to stay for dinner, anything to have another voice in that empty, empty space. It wasn't so different now, except that he'd learned how not to be so pathetically obvious about it.

The cook had made plaice, with asparagus and new potatoes the size of grapes. It was delicious.

# # #

_ He is a guest in your home,  _ Mycroft reminded himself.  _ Also, you are in a position of authority over him. _ _ The suggestion would be inappropriate, when he might feel pressured to comply. _

_ Furthermore, he is injured. _

_ Also, you used him poorly the last time you invited him to bed. He neither trusts nor likes you now. That is not a repairable breach. _

And so when Mycroft offered, over postprandial coffee, it was only because the thought of another body somewhere in that cavernous and echoing house was comforting. “It would be more convenient for you simply to stay here for the next few days,” he said. “You can use the computer more easily that way. We'll have your own things brought over in the morning. Meanwhile, there is a guest bedroom on the ground floor with everything you might require for the night.”

Greg looked down. He inhaled deeply, eyes drifting shut, and licked his lips. His hand tapped the coffee cup as he considered. Then he looked at Mycroft and said, “I remember the way to yours.”

Mycroft meant to say, “That is unnecessary, and probably unwise, given your injury.”

He said, “Oh.” And then he'd shoved back his chair and was standing before he knew he meant to do so, saying, “Please.”

# # #

There was a fire in the fireplace this time, burnt down to glowing coals and ash. The sheets were softer than he remembered, softer even than Mycroft's fine hands as he skimmed off Greg's pants and pressed him gently to lie on his back.

“It would be better for you to stay like this,” Mycroft said. His hand slid down Greg's good side, curled over a thigh and brushed against his bollocks. His eyes went dark and hungry at Greg's sucked-in breath. “Tell me what you want, and I'll do the work.” He leaned over, rubbing his cheek across Greg's abdomen. “I would like—may I—?” His breath on Greg's prick kindled something Greg had thought long burnt away.

“Please, yes,” he said, trying to keep still, trying not to squirm and pull his stitches.

Mycroft sat up to reach for the condoms in the bedside drawer, and Greg blurted recklessly, “Can we not? Not use those?”

Mycroft swallowed hard, fumbled out a bottle of lube with unsteady hands, and left the drawer hanging open. Then a warm, wet mouth closed around him and Greg jerked despite his best intentions, making Mycroft cough around his bare prick and setting off a flare of heat across his ribs.

The pain in his side drew everything out, slowed it down. He found he really didn't mind that, not when it meant being sucked for a long, lovely time without fear of embarrassing himself by going off in the first few minutes. He tried not to be a selfish bastard but it was so  _ good, _ and Mycroft didn't seem to be in any hurry even though his jaw was surely killing him. Not until the tip of that wicked tongue worked under his foreskin after what felt like hours did he gasp, “Coming,  _ coming,”   _ hand tightening in Mycroft's hair warningly. Mycroft hesitated but stayed right there around his prick, and  _ Christ,  _ it'd been a long time since anyone had done that for him. It was everything Greg could do not to tear his stitches.

When he opened his eyes, Mycroft was spitting discreetly into a tissue, and Greg felt his world lurch. Oh, not again, surely; not  _ another  _ set-up, damn it. What a fucking idiot he was, thinking— “Asparagus,” Mycroft explained hastily, seeing his expression, and the cold, sinking feeling in his gut lightened after a second.

“ I'll be a gentleman and spare you the experience,” Mycroft told him good-naturedly with a crooked smile. He settled himself on his side at an angle to Greg, bent Greg's legs up over his own, and rubbed his hard prick to Greg's arse. “If I may?” Greg hiked his legs a little higher, careful of his ribs, Mycroft budged a bit closer, and  _ oh right there yes. _

Then there was an awful lot of cool slickness against his arsehole, followed by a fat cockhead. Greg kept breathing—a bit nervously, because he wasn’t stretched, and it had been a long damned time but he still remembered how much it could cramp if this bit went south—and it slowly pressed against him, slowly slid in, slowly opened him and  _ took  _ in a way so different to fingers. Mycroft spent a long, easy time fucking, barely rocking his hips. It would have been useless to get Greg off—wrong angle, hardly any friction—but since he was most definitely done for the night, he just relaxed into it and watched Mycroft enjoy himself.

There was a fresh pink scar on his side. What was Mycroft still recovering from besides the heart attack? Maybe everything was going so slowly tonight not because that's the way he wanted it but because that's all he had the strength and stamina for.

“My physician has cleared me for strenuous physical activity, so if you would please stop making me think about her right now and instead move—” He made a high, strangled sound when Greg tightened around him, and a few moments later he pushed in hard and went very still, exhaling loud, shuddering breaths through his nose.

Then he slipped out and shoved two fingers up Greg's wet arse without so much as a by-your-leave, and God, that was  _ rude,  _ rude and blindingly hot, feeling that warm trickle down his skin. Greg squirmed helplessly, half laughing, and thumped his head back on the pillow. “Shit,” he gasped. “Shit. I wish I'd met you when I was twenty and could get it up again.”

Mycroft had the most peculiar expression on his face. “Do you,” he said slowly, not a question, and Greg hummed agreeably.

A little while later, when the lights were off and Greg was drifting in a pleasant fog of relaxation, Mycroft said, “Another time, one without asparagus, I would—if you like, I would be willing. It was only that particular taste.”

_ So that’s what an apology from a Holmes six years after the fact sounds like.  _ The house was so quiet that Greg could hear each of them breathing in the dark. “Yeah,” he finally said. “Yeah, okay.”

  
He didn't remember falling asleep. When he woke himself rolling onto his ribs in the middle of the night, it was to soft, even breathing on the other side of the bed and a bony ankle hooked possessively over his own. The pillow smelt nice. He went back to sleep.

 


	4. Chapter 4

“Right, that's torn it.” Greg hauled Sherlock up by the elbow—oh, fucking hell, his _stitches_ —and marched him down the hallway, giving him a good shove over the front threshold. “Out. Now. You're off the case. You're off every damned case from now 'til Doomsday. _That's_ how badly you just cocked up.”

“Oh, please. You need me too mu—”

“Did I get this angry when you _set my flat on fire?_ Take a minute, Sherlock. Take a damned minute and consider that you just shocked four homicide detectives. Christ, two of us remember the shit that used to come out of your mouth when you were high, and you still—” Greg shut his eyes and sucked in a breath slowly. “Get out.” He slammed the door, then had to lean one hand against the aluminium and press the other into his ribs until he could stand straight again.

 # # #

Long hours later, Donovan not only drove him back to his own flat through Friday-night traffic but also said not a word about Sherlock, which frankly qualified her for sainthood. She shouldn't have been driving with one eye still swollen shut, but he could hardly bring that up when he wasn't supposed to be on duty at all.

He cleared his throat. “Didn't get to thank you the other day.”

“No, you did. You don't remember?”

He didn't. He remembered rounding the corner, seeing Crombley's shoulder move forward and back, feeling the knife point bang down ribs on its way to his stomach. He remembered Donovan skidding around him, slapping Crombley's wrist from below, forcing it up. He remembered Crombley kicking her in the face. He definitely remembered her punching the bastard straight in the bollocks, and would probably see that in his sleep for months to come. But he didn't remember much afterwards.

“I heard Crombley didn't have any accidents on the way to his cell, after all the excitement.”

She kept her eye on the road and said evenly, “Knew you wouldn't want it, sir.”

On his better days, that was likely true.

She let him out in front of his building. There was absolutely no reason for him to feel so flat when he got off the lift and unlocked his own door, when he walked into his perfectly nice living room with much better furniture than he'd lost in the fire.

His mobile rang as he was debating takeaway versus a butty, on his way to check the contents of the kitchen.

“I've sent a car. The menu tonight is beef, by the way.”

 _Arrogant sod,_ he thought, almost fondly. “Don't know that I'm in the mood for bee— _Jesus Christ!”_ He slammed the refrigerator door shut, clapping a hand over his mouth and trying not to breathe through his nose.

“Inspector?”

“Sherlock's been at my kitchen.”

“...Ah. I'll have cleaners out in the morning, shall I?”

Greg resisted the masochistic urge to open the door again and check that it _really was_ just that bad. “I'll be wanting a damned good drink with dinner.”

 # # #

The day had passed with a pleasant undercurrent, anticipation pooling thick and heavy in his groin even throughout his loathsome circumnavigation of the garden. He had so little else to occupy his mind. He filled it with images of dragging his fingertips down through the hair of Greg's abdomen, sweeping across the curve of his inner thigh. As the afternoon gave way to dusk, he showered again and took special care shaving.

Greg had lines of pain and weariness around his eyes when he stripped off his overcoat in the foyer, and the hitch in his movements suggested recently strained stitches. The tired, bright smile spreading over his face when Mycroft traded him whisky for coat set Mycroft's stomach fluttering.

Supper was rich and comforting. He sat across from Greg and counted down the mouthfuls until he could press himself close, soak up that warmth and easy sensuality. He thought about the lube and no condoms on his nightstand and had to take slow, deep breaths.

He poured himself another whisky after supper, with an eye towards loose-limbed relaxation and slightly delayed arousal. Greg nodded at his inquiring eyebrow, and sipped his own refilled tumbler with half-lidded eyes and a flattering fullness beginning to press at his fly.

“God, I needed that,” he sighed, stretching his stockinged feet towards the fire and splaying out his toes. “I don't even want to think about what's in my bedroom, given the fridge. Something awful, I'm sure; he was right pissed off.”

Mycroft froze. “The refrigerator was...punitive. Not an experiment?”

Greg snorted. “I kicked him off a crime scene. He'll make me pay for that for weeks.”

John in Bruges. Greg in Sherlock's black books, and vice versa. Mrs Hudson unable to rein in his high-strung brother at the best of times. And Mycroft _oblivious._

He shot a look at the clock. _How many hours, now?_

Greg, watching him keenly, dropped his eyes to his tumbler.

“I'm sorry.” Mycroft was already paging his driver. “Please avail yourself—” he made a gesture encompassing the house and environs as he left the room. “It's the least I can do.”

 # # #

Sherlock was, as expected, obnoxious, obstreperous, and thoroughly vicious, and Mycroft would cheerfully have stabbed his ferrule through the little bastard's foot a hundred times over the next nine hours and sixteen minutes had Sherlock ever come down off the furniture.

In the morning, before he left, he hobbled stiffly to the lamp to which Sherlock's gaze had strayed when Mycroft's need to use the lavatory during the seventh hour had become too great to ignore. There was a small glass vial within the pipe, snugged tight against the cord.

Sherlock objected, “John will think I took it.”

Mycroft remembered Montague Street, remembered hunching over his brother's body and hyperventilating as he dialled 999, silently begging _breathe, please breathe._ “God forbid we should upset _John,”_ he said, and he was tired enough to let some of the bitterness leak into his tone.

The vial went into his pocket, and Mycroft went down the stairs, ignoring Sherlock's increasingly frantic protests as he followed: “It's _important,_ Mycroft, you can't, it's highly symbolic and _very important_ to John, you can't take it, he needs it, it needs to be here when he gets back, you don't understand, don't _do_ this—”

And Mycroft was not thinking—he was not—about Montague Street, nor about how Sherlock had never once apologised for making his brother find him like that, nor about the years Mycroft had been coming home to an empty house and a cold bed because he could not run the world and protect his brother and still have anything left for himself. He was not. He was not thinking about any of that when he stopped at the kerb beside the car, plucked the vial from his pocket, dropped it on the pavement, and held Sherlock's eyes as he brought his heel down on it with a good deal more force than he'd intended.

They both stared at the glittering starburst on the pavement.

" _Why?”_ Sherlock's dressing gown fluttered as his sides heaved. The movement was visually disturbing. Mycroft averted his eyes.

His lips were numb. His tongue was thick and uncooperative. “All you've done is replace one addiction with another. He's got to be something more than your new habit, Sherlock.” His hands were all pins and needles. His heel throbbed. He fumbled with the car door and clambered through, slamming it behind him.

He could not quite catch his breath. The world was growing sharp and bright-edged.

“Home,” he told the driver, and seconds later he told himself not to be a fool and amended, “No, the Heart Centre,” as he carefully held his phone in both hands and thumbed Eliza's icon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you from the bottom of my heart, every patient saint of you who waited, encouraged me, and responded to this fic during its very long hiatus. My gratitude is humble and endless. I am deeply sorry to those of you to whose comments I have not yet replied, and I am slowly attempting to catch up whenever life allows. 
> 
> Most particular thanks to Pat_is_fannish, ancientreader, and AxeMeAboutAxinomancy, for friendship above and beyond.


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